Here are three 2 & 1/2 hour sessions of HHDL expounding upon the Heart Sutra. (That means each is the length of an elaborate Hollywood blockbuster ).

I'm placing this here rather than in the Tibetan section since I think he takes pains to address concerns of various traditions, interpretations, schools of thought, etc.

Enjoy --

Session 1 (The sound is missing from the first 5 minutes or so of this session, but it involves introductions by others so you won't miss the Dalai Lama's address)http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/6858067

I have a question (I hope I haven't overlooked an obvious note) which I am sure someone (perhaps even Huifeng himself) can field. If the text was originally composed in Chinese, why is it also in Sanskrit? Is this an unusual situation? Wasn't the dissemination of early Buddhist texts generally an adoption by early scholar-monk's such as Zhi Qian or Xuanzang? Was this translation from an early Chinese Buddhist canon into Sanskrit? I am sure I have gotten something backwards, but I am not sure what it might be.

Su DongPo wrote:I have a question (I hope I haven't overlooked an obvious note) which I am sure someone (perhaps even Huifeng himself) can field. If the text was originally composed in Chinese, why is it also in Sanskrit? Is this an unusual situation? Wasn't the dissemination of early Buddhist texts generally an adoption by early scholar-monk's such as Zhi Qian or Xuanzang? Was this translation from an early Chinese Buddhist canon into Sanskrit? I am sure I have gotten something backwards, but I am not sure what it might be.

The argument that it was originally composed in Chinese, and argument it is - not proven fact, would say that it was first in Chinese and was then back translated into Sanskrit. That is neither difficult to understand, nor entirely unlikely, either.

The key question is the role of Kumarajiva's translation. If you look at the document I linked above, you can easily see that what we now consider to be the earliest extant version of the Heart Sutra, ie. Kumarajiva's 大明咒經, has a lot of exact matches with his translation of the so-called medium length Prajnaparamita (maybe the Pancavimsati-sahasrika, but more likely a kind of Dvavimsatika-sahasrika). Later versions of the Heart sutra, in all languages, do not have some specific parts that connect Kumarajiva's two texts.

But, and here's the catch, the supposed Sanskrit of the Heart Sutra and the Pancavimsata, do NOT match up. In fact, the Sanskrit of the Heart Sutra is really quite strange, it has some expressions which though understandable on a semantic level, are quite different from the Sanskrit we see in all the other Prajnaparamita texts. eg. 以無所得故 is a common phrase in the Chinese, but the Sanskrit: "nAprAptitvAt" is unattested in any other text, which always has something like "na upalabhyate" for this expression.

And, due to the fact that the early and middle period translations into Chinese would often use the same Chinese term for multiple different Sanskrit terms, eg. 得 for >labh, >prapta, & >abhisambudh, it means that it is quite conceivable that someone back translating into Sanskrit from the Chinese would come up with what we now have as the Sanskrit. (Provided they knew Sanskrit, but were not exactly 100% fluent in Sanskrit Prajnaparamita literature.)

So this is kind of how Nattier argues the case. Then the head and tail of the Heart Sutra are appended on for various reasons to this chunk taken from the 3rd chp (?) of the Pancavimsati. Though for Nattier, she doubts that the earliest Chinese Heart Sutra is from Kumarajiva, but comes later. But I suspect she has made a mistake on her sources through the Taisho.

Dan Lusthaus has made a few counter arguments to the idea that Kumarajiva's version is not the earliest, providing a few interesting Chinese sources from early to mid period masters in China, the sort of stuff that I think Nattier would probably never read. But, his arguments still do little if anything to counter her main thesis of the text being originally Chinese, from the Pancavimsati and then back translated into (dodgey) Sanskrit.

As for "scholarly," I would use it in one of two ways: 1) doing original research/scholarship in a special area of expertise, etc.; 2) being knowledgeable of the research done by others such a field. Most frequently both definitions apply. I think your reply proves that you have done extensive scholarly readings in this area, and I am grateful for your efforts.

I have another question: Are "Hrdaya" and "Heart" connected linguistically. i.e. through a common Indo-European root? Or are my eyes and ears leading me to jump to such a hypothesis? I did a quickie search and didn't find anything. I would guess anyone with knowledge of Sanskrit would be able to tell right away. Is this so?

Su DongPo wrote:I have another question: Are "Hrdaya" and "Heart" connected linguistically. i.e. through a common Indo-European root? Or are my eyes and ears leading me to jump to such a hypothesis? I did a quickie search and didn't find anything. I would guess anyone with knowledge of Sanskrit would be able to tell right away. Is this so?

I've tried this link a few times in recent days and it doesn't seem to be working. Do you have a better link, or can you or anyone confirm that it is okay? I don't get the usual error messages -- the connection just hangs out in the bardo.

Turning to and addressing Sariputra, the Buddha reiterated the essential point for the benefi t of those not understanding clearly. Sariputra was the best of the best, the most advanced sravaka, or hearer, renowned for his sagacity. According to an established Indian custom regarding personal names, a person could decide to use either his or her motherís or fatherís name, or both. The word sariputra (chiu lu tzu in Chinese) literally means a certain species of waterfowl similar to an egret. Sariputra chose to use the name of his mother, who was said by those who knew her to have luminous eyes like that particular bird. She had the reputation of surpassing her brothers in wisdom and keen spirit. Sariputraís mother was an adept of the heterodox path, and, as her name suggests, she was a person of the highest wisdom.